


Sixteen

by Firebog



Category: Supernatural
Genre: past hooker!Dean, the results of John Winchester's bad parenting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-30
Updated: 2014-03-30
Packaged: 2018-01-17 13:15:40
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,432
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1389046
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Firebog/pseuds/Firebog
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What was it with turning sixteen? Did it just make you crazy? Did it make you want to throw yourself to the wolves? It was like a fuse blew in your brain. You were always hungry at sixteen. You could take care of yourself at sixteen. You should be allowed to go on hunts at sixteen. You could kill monsters with the best of them at sixteen. At sixteen you could handle it; the epitome of invincible fucking teenager.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sixteen

**Author's Note:**

> The Background (Or things go AU and I feel like explaining where in hideously selective detail): The events of The Rapture (4.20) are slightly different, Amelia Novak is killed while she is possessed. Sam and Dean take in Claire temporarily, which turns into permanently when Dean at the end of Swan Song (5.22) takes Claire along with him to live with Lisa. Because it just wouldn't jive with the story the whole race to find Purgatory never happened. Cas successfully wins against Raphael due to reasons, you can insert your favourite reasons why. Otherwise events are much the same until Let it Bleed (6.21). Lisa does not recover. Dean is left with two kids and doesn't know what to do with them and prays to Cas for help. Cas shows and stays. He starts hunting with Dean and Sam and helps them to raise Ben and Claire. Oh, and I've decided that Ben and Claire are the same age. 
> 
> Dean turning tricks in his younger days and being confronted with it is the driving force behind this fic so if hookers offend/upset you now is your chance to leave. There's nothing particularly explicit though.
> 
> As far as the Nickerson goes, I just picked a town at random in Kansas. It doesn't have any meaning.

What was it about being sixteen? Had he been such an eager little shit to throw himself to the wolves at that age too? Had that been how he was before his first hunt? Teenagers, they really did think they were invincible. At least they had picked out something easy to hunt for Ben and Claire instead of a freaking werewolf or a banshee. He wondered what Cas had been doing at sixteen. Probably watching the first cells multiply or asteroids hitting primordial earth, something fucking crazy like that. He'd have to ask later. It would probably be one of his trippier angelic stories.

Dean spread out the map and grabbed the marker. He drew a circle around each location. Then drew a series of lines all spreading out from one focal point connecting to various circles. "Okay, so see how it all comes back to this one house?"

"Yeah." Ben leaned over the map. "It's where they died right?"

"Good." Dean encouraged. He tapped the map with the end of the marker, "So any thoughts on how our ghost is getting around town?"

"Haunted object." Claire said quickly. "Has to be."

"Right." Dean pushed a stack of police reports, newspaper clippings, and photos towards them. He couldn't help the wicked grin on his face. Something about watching young hunters suffer through paper work was cathartic. "Now you get to try and narrow it down. Tomorrow we'll see if you got it right."

Ben groaned. Claire leafed through the stack in silent dejection.

Dean dug through their cooler and took out a beer. They were squatting in an abandoned house just a little ways outside of town. It wasn't half bad for an abandoned house, less mouldy than usual and it was still furnished- sort of. Some of the furniture fell apart if you put a little too much weight on it. He dragged a sturdy chair over to the table and plunked down in it. He grabbed his phone and started texting Cas: _do u remember being 16?_

"Aren't you going to help?" Ben asked.

Dean glanced up from his phone. He took a sip of beer. Then set the beer down on the table. He arched an eyebrow at the kids' expectant faces, "Thought you wanted to learn to be hunters?"

"Yeah, but even you get Bobby to help you out with research sometimes." Claire reasoned.

Dean shrugged, "Then phone Bobby."

Ben and Claire looked at each other before turning back to the police reports. Neither one of them wanted to phone Bobby and ask for help on a simple ghost hunt. He'd call them idjits and hang up on them. They'd probably never live it down.

Dean looked to his phone. He smiled. Cas had replied: _I remember everything._ That was such a Cas answer. He rolled his eyes at it; angels and their perfect recall, don't rub it in or anything Cas. He texted back, _tell me about it tonite when u get in._

The sound of the impala announced Sam's return with the mother of all holies: Pie. He stayed in his chair waiting for Sam to come in. Sam was on the phone. He set a bag down in front of Dean. Dean pawed at it until it revealed the ultimate prize, apple pie. He took a swig of beer and opened the box. He stared for a moment when he realized they didn't have any forks or knives. Well they had knives, just not the kind he'd want to eat with. He looked over at Sam and caught his eye.

Sam reached into the other bag he had carried in and pulled out two sets of plastic cutlery in plastic packaging. He tossed it over to Dean.

Dean caught it. He tore one set open. It was funny that Sam had gotten plastic cutlery all packaged up in plastic. Sam was turning into the hippy of the family. He didn't even like it when they drank bottled water, something about moving water out of watersheds and plastic bottle islands the size of Texas. Whatever any of that meant. Dean didn't waste much time thinking on Sam's new found hippism before he started digging into the pie.

Dean glanced up, Ben and Claire were staring at the pie. He shovelled a fork full into his mouth and smiled, "Got any good leads? They might have earned you some pie."

"I think it's a wedding ring." Claire said immediately.

"I'm thinking jewellery too but I don't think it's a wedding ring. People tend to get buried with wedding rings." Ben said.

"Yeah, but our ghost was cremated." Claire said.

"Well then it's definitely not a wedding ring. Everything on them would have been burnt." Ben argued.

"A lot of crematoriums recommend not putting jewellery in with the body." Claire explained. "Or it could be a family heirloom. Something the family wouldn't want burned."

The kids looked to Dean, ever so hopeful. Dean pushed the pie towards them and tossed the second set of cutlery over. The kids looked pleased and surprised. As if he'd deny them pie. He was the fun parent. Didn't everyone know that? "Okay, so working theory is jewellery, possibly a wedding ring."

Sam came back into the room. He pulled over a chair. He tested it before he sat down. The furniture in the house all had a certain aged look to it that Sam didn't trust to support his weight. He pocketed his phone, "That was Bobby giving us the heads up. There's a hunter in town, Pete Chauchard. He's looking for a demon in town. Bobby told him where we were holed up. He's going to swing by later tonight and see if we've come across anything he might be interested in."

"Demon huh?" Dean took a sip of beer. "Did this Pete dude say anything else about it?"

Sam shook his head, "Usual hunter bull crap. Keeping everything tight lipped until it's over and they have a few drinks in them."

"Are we going to help?" Ben asked, trying to hide his excitement and failing badly.

Claire looked over, no better at hiding it.

" ** _We_** might." Dean pointed to himself and Sam. What was it with turning sixteen? Did it just make you crazy? They had been good level headed kids up until this year. Now it was all, I can take care of myself, we should be allowed to hunt. It was like a fuse had blown in their brains. He pointed to Ben and Claire, "You two are hunting a _ghost_."

"How's that coming anyway?" Sam asked curious.

"Claire thinks it's a wedding ring. I think it's some other kind of jewellery." Ben said.

Claire tapped the police report she was reading. "Actually I'm vetoing the wedding ring theory. Two of the attacks happened without the ghost's husband present."

Dean dragged the pie back to him. The kids had managed to polish off almost half of it. That part he remembered loud and clear. You were always hungry at sixteen. At sixteen he would have been able to devour a whole pie just as fast if they had had money for pie. He offered a plastic spoon to Sam. Sam shook his head no. Sam didn't know how to live. Pie was essential. "Okay so now we're down to just nameless unknown jewellery. Get back at it. You've got a ghost to hunt."

Sam chuckled, "Going to break out the cat o'nine tails?

Dean scowled at him. Why was everyone always challenging his reigning title as the fun parent? Sam was the do your homework and brush your teeth parent.

Sam smiled that annoying shit eating younger brother grin. Sam knew exactly what Dean was thinking. You didn't live with someone for most of your life and not get a feel for what was going on in their heads, "Come on Dean, someone has to lay down the rules and everyone knows Cas is the fun parent."

"I'm not the bad cop." Dean insisted. "That would be you and your lectures on the importance of flossing."

"Hey, everyone knows I'm the confidant." Sam grinned. He snagged the fork Dean had left in the pie plate because on second thought, eating Dean's pie would piss him off. That's what he got for being an obnoxious older brother all the time.

Dean turned to the kids for support. "Tell Sam I'm the fun one."

Claire and Ben leaned further into their reading.

Sam chuckled.

"Go to hell." Dean snatched his fork back from Sam.

\---

Dean looked over the work the kids had done. He had to admit it, they were probably right. All signs pointed towards haunted car and a ghost who hated people who were dangerous drivers. He hoped the husband had good car insurance. They'd have to torch it.

He checked his phone. Cas would be a little while yet. He was out doing whatever it was angels did all day. Probably something important; performing miracles, healing leprosy, appearing on tacos. Ben and Claire had gone upstairs to hit the hay an hour earlier after some arguments about hunters needing sleep. He didn't count as an example of what merited adequate sleep. They needed more than four hours, at least seven. He sent them upstairs to get ready for bed under threat of not getting to torch the car tomorrow. Shit. He really was the bad cop wasn't he?

Sam yawned and asked if it was okay if Dean met up with this Pete Chauchard alone. Dean didn't mind, he was staying up to wait for Cas anyway. Waiting for their mostly a mystery hunter Pete Chauchard to show his ugly mug was just a boring bonus.

It wasn't long before he heard a knock at the door. He answered with a gun in hand. They did the usual hunter tango; salt, silver, holy water. Pete Chauchard checked out. Not surprisingly so did Dean. He let Pete in and offered him a beer.

"Bobby said you're good with demons." Pete said over his beer.

"We're good at a lot of things." Dean responded. It was true, there wasn't much they had gone up against that they hadn't taken down. They had a bad track record with witches but they had taken out the real actual fucking devil. That had to give them some hunter street cred.

They talked hunting for a bit, feeling each other out. Pete obviously didn't believe a guy twenty years his junior knew shit about hunting demons. Well in that case Dean didn't believe guys twenty years his senior were fast enough to hunt demons- Bobby excluded.

Pete pointed his beer bottle at Dean casually, "You know, you look kind of familiar."

Dean shrugged, "If you've been around hunting long enough everyone starts to look familiar. One dude in plaid with scars and crazy eyes look a lot like the next."

"Yeah, I guess." Pete didn't look convinced. "So this demon, I think it's been making deals in town at a church group of all things."

Dean shook his head, "What is it with religious types making deals? You'd think they'd know better."

Pete shrugged. "Guess demons just like selling sin to saints."

"Tell me about it." Dean thought back to that little town that the Whore had corrupted. Good people probably until she had shown up and then things had festered.

"Seriously, you sure we haven't met before?" Pete had his face all screwed up trying to remember. "I'm thinking maybe fifteen years back- no probably more like twenty. Yeah twenty sounds about right. You hunt in Nickerson then? I think I was there clearing out a vamp nest with a couple of hunters around then."

"Dude I would have been like-" He would have been sixteen. Dean stopped realizing that yeah, he did know the guy, he just didn't know him from hunting. "No."

"Seriously?" Pete went on. Pete didn't take the hint. Pete struck Dean as the kind of guy who would never take the hint. Pete set his beer down. "You weren't hunting in Nickerson?"

"Yeah, seriously, I wasn't hunting in Nickerson." Dean snapped, "So how do you plan on taking out this demon?"

They talked shop for a bit. The plan was simple. Devil's trap at the house it was living in, exorcism, probably a quick burial for the poor bastard that was being possessed, then high tailing it out of town before the cops wised up.

Pete cocked his head to the side. He just wouldn't let it go. "Maybe it wasn't vamps in Nickerson. Maybe that was ghouls...ghouls sound familiar?"

"Look I have been all over the damned country hunting everything since I was a kid. Even if I was in Nickerson why would I remember you? One town is the same as the next." Dean slammed his beer down on the table. The marker jumped with the force of it and rolled off the table.

Pete's eyes widened. Yeah. Pete had figured it out. Fuck Pete and his seemingly angelic fucking recall. "Shit."

Dean tried to make his face stony and unreadable. He knew what was coming. He could tell Pete wasn't the type to bow out gracefully either.

"You were the scrawny guy out back..."

\---

Ben and Claire crouched behind the double doors that lead into the living room. The doors were open just a hair's width. Just enough to see in and if they stood far enough back Dean wouldn't see them. They had snuck downstairs when they heard the other hunter come in. A demon hunt was exciting. If they couldn't go on it at least they could listen in on the details. Gather some intell and one day prove that they could run a demon hunt just as easily as a ghost hunt. Except Dean and this other hunter, they weren't talking about demons anymore.

They watched as Dean went very still. Then he broke out in motion, grabbing his beer and holding it in front of himself protectively. Twitching his leg impulsively. Rapping his fingers along the side of his beer. Clearly agitated, "Yeah, well I'm not that guy anymore."

The other hunter looked Dean up and down. "Yeah, no shit. Well I guess it couldn't have fucked you up any more than hunting did."

Dean was across the room in a flash. He jabbed his beer bottle into the other hunter's chest. There was murder in Dean's eyes. "You tell anyone and I **_will_** find you. I'm a hunter now, I've got guns."

"Whoa there boy, it's not like I was saying you were bad at it." The other hunter threw his hands up in defence, "And it's not like I go around telling people what I get up to out back of bars. And you know you _weren't_ bad at it, just for the record."

Ben and Claire looked at each other wondering what had just happened. They both jumped when they felt hands on their shoulders. Castiel stood behind them. He raised a finger to his mouth for silence, then pointed upstairs. They nodded and pretended to start up.

As soon as they saw the light at the bottom of the stairs disappear they went back down to listen. Even an angel wasn't going to deprive them of listening in on the adult conversations. They were almost adults now too. With the way Sam and Dean and Cas treated them they would never learn anything about hunting any other way. They crept closer to the doors, fearless of the dark or what they might hear.

\---

Castiel flew to the location Dean had given. It was an old house. He was surprised, he would have guessed a motel. He was further surprised to find Claire and Ben still awake. He appeared in the hallway and crept up behind them. He pointed them up the stairs and then walked in to check on Dean. Castiel had never seen Dean this blindingly angry before. It was at odds with Dean's upset and agitated prayer from a moment ago, _Fuck_ _Cas, I need you, like yesterday._

"Dean. Is everything alright?" Castiel asked staring down the stranger in the room. He set a hand on Dean's shoulder and quickly snatched it back when Dean glanced back at him with prickling anger. He had meant the gesture to be comforting.

"Yeah Cas, everything's fine." Dean was staring holes through the stranger.

Castiel looked between the stranger and Dean. Dean was clearly upset at or about this strange man. He narrowed his eyes at the stranger, "I think it is time you left."

"Yeah." The stranger agreed. "I'll call if the demon thing goes south."

It wasn't until he was out the door that Dean let out a long breath. Dean sat down and slumped in the chair. He motioned for Cas to come over. Cas stood before him. Dean wrapped his arms around him and buried his face in Cas's stomach. He held Cas for just a moment, then let go. He was stronger than that. He didn't need to hold on to someone and cry like a girl. He settled back into his chair.

"What happened?" Castiel asked.

"He recognized me." Dean said. It was so stupid. How had he run into Pete of all people? Pete had been the first one. It was the only reason Dean remembered him in particular. Pete was the aftermath of getting two months of freedom from dad and hunting all because he lost the food money on a bet. Dad had made it clear that if Dean ever lost the food money again he could stay lost with it. So when his gambling went south again...well as Pete had put it, he had been the scrawny guy out back.

"From where?" Castiel asked. Few people could actually recognize the Winchesters on sight, "Why is that bad?"

"Cas, he recognized me because I was hanging around outside the back of a bar." Dean said disgusted with the very words.

Castiel frowned for a moment, not understanding at first, then realization dawned on him. Dean had made comments about hanging around at the back of bars and how he shouldn't do that least someone made assumptions. He stroked Dean's face, "It's alright now."

"It's **_so_** not alright." Dean leaned into the touch. Then gave in to it completely. He pulled Cas in close to him and wrapped his arms around him. He buried his face in Cas's shirt. He wasn't as strong as he thought he was.

"It's not something you should be ashamed of, there is no shame in it." Castiel ran a hand through Dean's hair. He could almost feel the shame and grief and anger all piling on top of each other, "...if you want it, I can hide that memory from you."

Dean went very still. He sat back.

Dean had been crying silently. Castiel's shirt was damp. Castiel pulled a chair over and sat across from Dean. He set his hands on Dean's knees.

"No." Dean said very quietly, "No, I can't start picking and choosing what I remember just because I feel messed up about it."

Castiel reached out to stroke Dean's face. "I love you, Dean."

"Yeah, I know." Dean wouldn't look up. He could feel tears welling up in his eyes again. How did Cas just love him no matter what new horror stories from Dean's past sprung up. Dean didn't even have the handy, well it was capital H, Hell excuse. No Dean had started loitering out behind bars all on his own, "Don't know how you love me when I used to do things like- _that_."

"It does not matter to me whether you did that or not. I love you." Castiel pulled him close and wrapped his arms around him. They sunk to the floor intertwined. Dean holding on tightly to him. Dean buried his face into Castiel's shoulder. Castiel tightened his arms around Dean. Castiel was sure this time he had the right gesture at the right moment.

\---

Ben and Claire had receded to the shadows when that other hunter had come to the door and left. They crept back to the double doors. They looked to one another confused. Dean had looked ready to murder the other hunter, then Castiel had shown up and kicked the guy out. Now...

Now Dean had broken down. Castiel was holding a shivering quaking mess called Dean. They crept back upstairs as it started to get uncomfortable to watch. Dean was having a rough time, best to give them privacy.

They shut themselves in their room. They could hear Sam snoring in the room next door. They crawled into their sleeping bags.

"What the hell was that?" Ben said as he scooted down into his sleeping bag as far as he could go. "I mean the guy obviously knew him but I've never seen Dean look at another hunter like that and then after..."

"I think-" Claire stopped and turned red. Ben couldn't see the flush of her face in the darkness.

"What?" Ben asked, curious. Claire had known Dean just a little bit longer than he had. Sometimes it gave her a little bit more insight into what was going on with him. Some days he was jealous about that but then he would remember that it meant he got two years longer with his mother than Claire had with hers.

Claire grabbed the clothes she would wear tomorrow and stuffed them into her sleeping bag to keep them warm overnight. She didn't really want to say what it was she thought was going on, "I think Dean might have, maybe used to... _frequent alleys_."

"Frequent alleys?" Ben pulled the sleeping bag tight around his face, "What-oh. Oh!"

"Yeah." Claire agreed. " _Oh_."

Neither of them could sleep that night. Dean would be pissed in the morning when they admitted to getting maybe two hours of sleep. He'd still let them torch the car though.

\---

It was a frenzied desperate race to orgasm. Brief frantic sex. The kind Dean called 'straight up fucking'. Quick and to the point. Castiel didn't mind it when that's all Dean wanted. He simply preferred it when they took a bit more time, but tonight was not a night to try and persuade Dean otherwise. It was obvious Dean was seeking release, release from his past, his troubles, the way he felt. Dean wanted oblivion.

He was not surprised that Dean's response to tonight's emotional distress was sex. There were really only two ways Dean Winchester dealt with stressful emotion, drinking and sex. He had already been drinking and that hadn't helped. Sex would be the next logical step in Dean's mind. Afterwards Castiel pulled his trench coat up over them.

"So what were you doing at sixteen?" Dean asked. He bunched the trench coat up around his face. His knees stuck out the bottom.

Castiel thought about it for a moment. That had been a very long time ago. He called up the memory. "I was watching cyanobacteria poison the world."

Dean laughed. He fucking knew it. Only a fucking angel would casually watch the world being poisoned at sixteen, "What the hell is cyanobacteria?"

"A nitrogen fixing prokaryote bacteria whose chief by-product is oxygen. It devastated life on earth when it was largely an anaerobic world." Castiel explained.

Dean let out a breathy laugh. Crazy fucking angelic life history of the world acid trip. He could probably keep Cas talking about that for hours. Dean understood maybe half those words. Normally he didn't give a crap about stuff like that but listening to Cas talk about it...well he could listen to Cas for a long while. Cas wasn't talking about that kind of stuff as an abstract theory Cas had seen it; watched those prokaryote critters poison the world with....what? Nitrogen? Oxygen? Was he still even talking about earth? Was earth the anaerobic world? Fuck, how had he persuaded something so fucking unknowable to have sex with him more than once?

"What were you doing at sixteen?" Castiel asked.

Dean breathed in sharply. There went the post-sex and the post-angelic history lesson high. Cas wouldn't know any better. He had never told him. He didn't know he was just pouring lemon juice and rubbing ginger into the wound Pete fucking Chauchard had opened up tonight.

"Killed a werewolf. It was my first hunt." Dean said. He could think back on that fondly at least, well sort of.

"Ah, is that why Claire and Ben are being allowed to hunt this ghost? It's a rite of passage?" Castiel asked. "Sam also mentioned that his first hunt was at sixteen."

"Yeah. I guess it is." Dean liked that. A rite of passage. It sounded better than dad giving him a slap on the back and then ruining that moment where he had felt proud for a second by telling him he could have done better. Target practice Dean, you killed this one with a lucky shot the next time you might not have someone there to help clean up your mistakes.

They sat quietly for a bit. Dean fidgeted. Finally he decided to just spit it out. Cas deserved to know it all, the whole sad sop story. He could commit it to his perfect fucking memory. Add it to the list that Cas must keep called Reasons Why Dean Winchester is Screwed Up. Why the hell did Cas love him the way he did? "I...ah....just after that werewolf thing I screwed up and lost all the money dad left for me and Sam while he was out hunting. Got caught stealing and was carted off to a boys home. Dad left me there as a punishment but it was...it was good."

"Good?" Castiel was surprised, punishment from authority was not something Dean usually thought was good.

"Yeah. For two months one summer I had a pretty normal life. I did normal stuff, for two whole months. I didn't have to do any hunting, didn't have to even think about it. I got to just be a kid. Learned guitar, joined the wrestling team, almost went to a school dance. Kid stuff." Dean said. Now that he could remember fondly, there was no taint on that, not until he had left. "Then dad came back and got me."

"You sound sad about that." Castiel observed. There were many times that Dean's words did not match up to his tone of voice. Castiel found it was the tone of voice that was more important.

"Well, yeah. I mean I was worried about Sam while I was there but all that responsibility? It wasn't mine. For two months it wasn't mine." Dean said. He breathed deeply trying to summon up the courage to say what came next. He wished he was five and could just hide under Cas's trench coat for the rest of his life and pretend it could keep him safe, "Then dad came, picked me up, and dumped me and Sam off in some seedy trucker motel and disappeared for three months and well, you know, what was I supposed to do? We had money for a week, could have been two if I had known he wouldn't show and really stretched it."

"I take it you phoned Bobby?" Castiel guessed. Bobby had always been a solid point in the Winchesters' very mobile lives.

Dean looked away, "Yeah, but Bobby didn't answer, turned out he had gone to Japan."

"Oh."

Dean knew he could finish the story with that, Cas wouldn't press him for more. He licked his lips, nervous. He hadn't told anyone before. Not ever. "You have to swear you won't tell anyone. Ever."

"That you phoned Bobby? Or that you enjoyed the lack of responsibility." Castiel asked confused as to why either of those things would require an oath of secrecy.

"No. I mean, I'm gonna tell you something I never told anyone else and I need you to promise you won't tell anyone. Fuck, don't even tell _me_ after." Dean explained.

"Oh. I can not promise I won't tell anyone until I've heard it." Castiel said.

Dean rolled his eyes. "Cas, it's not like it's some word of god, world changing bullshit. It's just something I never told anyone before."

"...can I promise not to tell anyone as long as it does not hinder life saving events or attempts to wage war against Hell...or further any destruction of Heaven?" Castiel was wary of making ambiguous deals. It was how they landed in so much hot water.

Dean was tempted to just give up and not say anything at all, "Yeah, sure."

"Okay. Then with those amendments to the agreement I promise I will not tell anyone. Not even you." Castiel said solemnly.

"Well I phoned Bobby, then phoned around looking for Bobby. Then I tried everyone else I could think of and got no one. I had enough money to rent the room for one more night but after that we'd be on the street. I gave the dude at the desk every last dime we had then tried to think up a way to make enough cash for at least a couple more nights and well...I knew people thought I was kind of pretty to look at." Dean could tell that Cas had no idea where he was going with the story. His palms started to sweat from nervousness, "So, I mean, it's a truck stop motel in the middle of nowhere and stereotypes are there for a reason. So I, ya know, turned a few tricks and got the cash."

Castiel looked at him concerned, "You did tricks for money? I hope you did not engage with witches and that you mean slight of hand."

Dean turned red. Only Cas would be confused by that. He was going to have to actually say it, spell it out in no uncertain terms, "No, I mean....I sold myself. Just hand jobs, okay blow jobs too but that was it. It was really easy money, so whenever dad would disappear and the cash ran out and I couldn't make it hustling pool- well I had to feed Sammy somehow. I never told anyone. I think dad must have figured it out though because a few months before I turned nineteen he started looking at me funny and then not long after he sat me and Sammy down one day and showed us how to scam credit cards."

"Oh." Castiel said again.

"Oh? Dude I just told you I was kind of a hooker for almost two years and all you can say is oh?" Dean felt his shoulders start to tighten and pull in protectively. How could Cas just say 'oh' to that? Why wasn't Cas disgusted by it? By him? He sure as hell was.

"It is a very old profession." Castiel offered. The silence stretched. Castiel's eyebrows slowly pulled down, he looked at Dean, "Is that why you react strangely sometimes when we kiss or touch?"

"I don't know, probably." Dean shrugged. He rolled his shoulders a little trying to relax them. For some reason he had never really realized before that that had all gone down in one year. Each chunk had felt like a year on its own, like he was a completely different person in each part. Dean the newly minted hunter, daddy's little soldier in training. Dean the civilian, worried about a stupid dance. Dean the skank, thinking about how next time he'd stick his jacket under his knees. "So yeah...that's what I was doing when I was sixteen."

Castiel pulled him in tight. He didn't need to say I love you again, not when Dean had his ear to his chest and he could hear Castiel's heart pounding. It always did that when Dean touched him even when he tried to will it to stop, not that he ever wanted it to stop.

Dean leaned his head against Cas's chest listening to Cas's heart beat the minutes away while he remembered finally making that choice. Fuck, it was better than watching your kid brother starve on the street right? He had been sixteen, he could handle it; the epitome of invincible fucking teenager. He could take anyone if it got out of hand or too rough. He had just killed a _real_ monster after all. Yeah, he had thrown himself to the wolves at that age. What was it about being sixteen?


End file.
